Hi! :)

[Amelaclya]

Hello all, I am new to these forums and just thought I'd introduce myself. I have been having LDs occasionally since I was a little kid, not knowing what they were. I realize at some point that I'm dreaming and begin to control it. Unfortunately they never lasted for more than a few minutes and I almost always have just started flying towards some real world location that I've always wanted to visit, Especially since I have learned that time is short. Disney world when I was a child, to Hawaii and Paris as an adult I never really thought of these dreams as anything out of the ordinary except a few times while talking to friends about weird/scary dreams we've had, I've told them about it and they all look at me like I'm crazy So anyway, I found an article about 10 ways to sleep better recently (I have horrible sleeping patterns) and one of the ways was to teach yourself to LD. I was amazed to find that the dreams I've been having all my life actually have a name and other people experience them too. I also was pleasantly surprised to find that you can actually teach yourself to do it So I googled it and here I am. I want to thank everyone that contributed to the site, I am in the process of trying out some of the techniques (especially WILDs) but have not been successful yet. Any advice would be appreciated So far, I have gotten myself to the point where my entire body is numb and I'm feeling vibrations but haven't been able to go beyond that. What exactly does sleep paralysis feel like? When I'm attempting it, I *can* force myself to move, but if I concentrate on parts of my body while lying still, I can't actually feel them (no feeling of lying on the bed, or my clothes or the blanket etc). Unfortunately, my boyfriend snores I can usually drown it out to sleep normally, and even with it I can get to the point I described, but is this preventing me from going further? Is perfect silence absolutely necessary? Also, I am a bit afraid of the hypnagogic hallucinations. A couple times in my life (usually upon waking) I have experienced these (I think). Once I was lying in bed in my dorm room, and had a "dream" that someone came in and was pulling the sheet down around me so tight I couldn't breathe. Another time I was just waking in the morning and kept hearing voices that were preventing me from falling back asleep. Both times scared the crap out of me. Because I've had experiences like this in the past, is this what it will always be like for me? On a side note, does anyone here read "The Wheel of Time"? Some characters in the books are "Dreamwalkers". Always when reading I thought how cool it would be to be able to do that. If you having read it, check it out, I'm sure you guys will appreciate that portion of it